Vanishing England eBook

Stories and legends have clustered around them.
There is the famous Stump Cross in Cheshire, the subject
of one of Nixon’s prophecies. It is supposed
to be sinking into the ground. When it reaches
the level of the earth the end of the world will come.
A romantic story is associated with Mab’s Cross,
in Wigan, Lancashire. Sir William Bradshaigh
was a great warrior, and went crusading for ten years,
leaving his beautiful wife, Mabel, alone at Haigh Hall.
A dastard Welsh knight compelled her to marry him,
telling her that her husband was dead, and treated
her cruelly; but Sir William came back to the hall
disguised as a palmer. Mabel, seeing in him some
resemblance to her former husband, wept sore, and
was beaten by the Welshman. Sir William made
himself known to his tenants, and raising a troop,
marched to the hall. The Welsh knight fled, but
Sir William followed him and slew him at Newton, for
which act he was outlawed a year and a day. The
lady was enjoined by her confessor to do penance by
going once a week, bare-footed and bare-legged, to
a cross near Wigan, two miles from the hall, and it
is called Mab’s Cross to this day. You can
see in Wigan Church the monument of Sir William and
his lady, which tells this sad story, and also the
cross—­at least, all that remains of it—­the
steps, a pedestal, and part of the shaft—­in
Standisgate, “to witness if I lie.”
It is true that Sir William was born ten years after
the last of the crusades had ended; but what does that
matter? He was probably fighting for his king,
Edward II, against the Scots, or he was languishing
a prisoner in some dungeon. There was plenty of
fighting in those days for those who loved it, and
where was the Englishman then who did not love to
fight for his king and country, or seek for martial
glory in other lands, if an ungrateful country did
not provide him with enough work for his good sword
and ponderous lance?

Such are some of the stories that cluster round these
crosses. It is a sad pity that so many should
have been allowed to disappear. More have fallen
owing to the indifference and apathy of the people
of England in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
than to the wanton and iconoclastic destruction of
the Puritans. They are holy relics of primitive
Christianity. On the lonely mountainsides the
tired traveller found in them a guide and friend,
a director of his ways and an uplifter of his soul.
In the busy market-place they reminded the trader
of the sacredness of bargains and of the duty of honest
dealing. Holy truths were proclaimed from their
steps. They connected by a close and visible
bond religious duties with daily life; and not only
as objects of antiquarian interest, but as memorials
of the religious feelings, habits, and customs of
our forefathers, are they worthy of careful preservation.